River Suite Deluxe with Panoramic Balcony-Window (S1) Cabin Reviews

My wife and I had a Category S1 stateroom (“Deluxe Suite with Panoramic Balcony-Window”), about 253 square feet. (I wouldn’t call it a suite, though; there was no separate sitting area.) We had a king size bed. The pillows were very ... Read More

My wife and I had a Category S1 stateroom (“Deluxe Suite with Panoramic Balcony-Window”), about 253 square feet. (I wouldn’t call it a suite, though; there was no separate sitting area.) We had a king size bed. The pillows were very “squishy”. There was a decent size bathroom, with a spacious shower. The shower had an overhead round rainfall showerhead as well as a handheld shower head. They were operated by separate pushbuttons (press pushbutton to turn on, press pushbutton to turn off or press the other pushbutton). There were dual sinks in the bathroom and a trash can. Each sink had two drawers for storage. There was a design flaw. If you are right-handed, it is extremely difficult to reach the toilet paper which is mounted to your immediate left when you sit on the toilet. It was uncomfortable to reach across your body with your right hand and effectively get toilet paper off the roll. My wife and I came up with a solution: take the toilet paper off the holder and put it in the bottom drawer by the toilet; then it is easily accessible. Two bathrobes were provided for each person—a heavier cotton bathrobe and a lightweight bathrobe. There were hooks in the bathroom. The toiletries were Etro from Milan (La Bottega Home Collection Musk).
A nice feature is that the bathroom floor is heated. There is no control for it, but it was never too hot. My wife and I learned late in the cruise to shut the bathroom door at night. We found that our room got hot in the middle of the night and we would be sweating, even though we had a cool setting on the thermostat (3 settings for amount of cold, with a “quick cool” feature). Due to the lock system on the rivers, we were told to keep our room window closed. We started shutting the bathroom door, and the bedroom remained cool at night.
In the stateroom there is a refrigerator and a desk with desk chair, and a lounge chair. There are wine and champagne glasses and a corkscrew in a drawer beside the refrigerator. The refrigerator is stocked with still water, sparkling water, Coke and Sprite. Upon arrival in the room, there was a full bottle of red wine on the desk and a smaller bottle of white wine.
Your Crystal listening devices are in a charging stand on the desk. There is a pair of Bushnell 7x35 binoculars as well. There are no hooks on the walls for hanging stuff. [Tip] I brought 3 magnetic hooks that I affixed to the walls, to use for hats and coats. There is an iPad in the room that is already logged into Wi-Fi and your account on the ship. You can store your suitcases under the bed.
There is a closet with 3-4 feet of hanger space. There are 5 shelves, 2 shoe shelves, 3 drawers, and a safe above some of the shelves. The safe is spacious and can fit a laptop computer. Behind the door are 4 hooks with a Crystal umbrella, a shoe horn, a hair dryer in a bag, and 1 other item I cannot recall.
There is a flat screen TV in the room. You can watch live TV and see views from the bow, stern, port, and starboard sides of the ship. You can also watch a variety of free movies. Be aware that the movie selection changes on the first of the month. My wife and I started watching one movie on June 30th and went to bed, intending to finish it the next day. We discovered that the movie was no longer available on July 1st.
There were at least 2 USA (Type A) and more than 2 European (Type F) power outlets in the room, as well as 3 USB power plugs for electronic devices [kudos to Crystal].
Our room on the Crystal Mahler had a “Panoramic Balcony-Window”. Using controls to the left of the window, you could lower a screen over the upper window to reduce the intensity of the sunlight. You could also completely lower the upper window to get fresh air. However, we were told to keep the window closed at night, because the ship might go through a lock, and the window should not be open. In some ports, we did not open the window, because another ship was docked right next to us on our side of the ship. Overall the panoramic balcony window was a disappointment. Read Less